I’ve been asked many times about whether I research before writing my historical novels, or as I go. The short answer is: I research as I go. But that’s partly because I’ve been writing, reading, and watching historical fiction for a long time. So, I already have at least a sense of the era. I know the basics about what the people wear, how they travel about, what conveniences they have and don’t have, etc., so when I sit down to write a book set in the past, I have enough information just to be dangerous.But the fun part comes as I’m writing, because that’s when things start to happen. Usually, I have the bare bones of a plot, but not the details. And the details, in my opinion, are what make a book. And the details are what I research when I’m in the process of writing. When I have to make decisions–about what someone is wearing in particular, about where a certain house or building is located, about what they might eat at a ball or fete, about a political event that’s happening–that’s when I do the research for that particular thing. I stop writing and start searching….

To Live the Impossible Dream or How I’m adapting to becoming a Full Time Writer It’s been a little over a year since I left my 21 year job as a Prep School Development Director to become a full time writer. You wouldn’t think adapting would be necessary when reaching your dream, but dreams don’t always match reality. No more twice-monthly paychecks. They come twice yearly, now. Then there’s medical insurance. I have to pay it myself. Yikes! I didn’t expect to miss the school as much as I do, nor the creative energy spinning around me there, but the Witchy Chicks have topped off the well of creative energy beautifully. Really, who wouldn’t want to leave their job for lots of great sex, psychic witches, scary ghosts, hunks who seduce, and kidnapping heroines with fuzzy purple handcuffs? I mean, the best part of a great story is living it, whether you’re writing or reading it. I don’t set my alarm clock anymore. Gee, somebody’s got to make the sacrifice. I often go from my bed to my computer, because I plot in my dreams, and I don’t stop writing, until I run out of creativity. Sometimes, my pesky muse…

I admit it. When I was growing up, I loved watching the Wizard of Oz, which was shown on TV once a year. I adored the magical and fantasy elements, and of course the HEA ending. But then I had teethed on fairy tales and already had magic, mystical creatures, resourceful heroines, and hunky, princely heroes firmly ingrained in my imagination. Then when I was eleven, I came across the book “Many Mansions” by Gina Cerminara, which was about the psychic Edgar Cayce. That was the beginning of my life-long interest in metaphysical subjects and in the Cayce readings. I was especially drawn to his readings about Atlantis (over 700 of them). So it’s no wonder that my books embraced romance and the paranormal from the very start. After I wrote the Shielder series (science fiction romance), I turned to romantic urban fantasy, and found the perfect venue for my fascination with Atlantis and all things paranormal. Enter the Sentinels, reincarnated Altantians whose sole purpose is to track Belians (evil Atlantians also coming to Earth to wreck havoc). Both Sentinels and Belians have superhuman powers, and they’re waging an ageless battle of good versus evil. But wait—there’s hope for our…

Paranormal fiction continues to be very popular right now, which is good for me since I’m now writing the third in my Milagro De Los Santos series. The last thing I need is for vampires to lose favor with the public, thereby forcing me to do something unpleasant, like getting a real job. (The New York Observer just ran a story in which writers confessed the hardship of being successful. Honestly, it made me want to smack these whining nitwits upside the head with an unabridged volume of Shakespeare’s tragedies.) As fictional characters, vampires have it all over other paranormal creatures. Mummies are always unraveling, and you can’t understand a thing they say through all that fabric. Cannibal zombies smell bad, have rotting flesh, and want to eat your brains. Don’t even try to write a clever conversation with a zombie; it can’t be done. Demons are too metaphysically ambiguous, and ghosts are useless as love interests since they lack corporeal being. Werewolves have a following, but writers constantly struggle with the perplexing problem of clothing. Half of werewolf books are devoted to the shapeshifters’ ripping off their clothing during transformations, and then finding themselves stark nekkid behind the 7-11…